小升初英语作文写作指导(优秀20篇)

1.A great poem is a fountain forever overflowing with the waters of wisdom and delight.(P.

B. Shelley ， British poet )伟大的诗篇即是永远喷出智慧和欢欣之水的喷泉。(英国诗人 雪莱。 P.B)

2.Art is a lie that tells the truth 。( Picasso ， Spanish painter )美术是揭示真理的谎言。 (西班牙画家 毕加索)

3.Humor has been well defined as thinking in fun while feeling in earnest. (Mark Twain ， American novelist )幽默被人正确地解释为“以诚挚表达感受，寓深思于嬉笑”。(美国小说家 马克·吐温)

4.The decline of literature indicates the decline of a nation; the two keep in their downward tendency.( Johan Wolfgang von Goethe ， German poet)文学的衰落表明一个民族的衰落。这两者走下坡路的时间是齐头并进的。(德国诗人歌德 。 J 。 W 。)

5.When one loves one‘s art no service seems too hard 。(O. Henry， American novelist)一旦热爱艺术，什么奉献也不难。 (美国小说家 欧·亨利)

Education 教育篇

6.And gladly would learn ， and gladly teach 。( Chaucer ， British poet)勤于学习的人才能乐意施教。(英国诗人， 乔叟)

7.Better be unborn than untaught ， for ignorance is the root of misfortune.(Plato ， Ancient Greek philosopher)与其不受教育，不如不生，因为无知是不幸的根源。(古希腊哲学家柏拉图)

Friendship 友谊篇

8. Some friends come and go like a season. Others are arranged in our lives for good reason.(Sharita Gadison)一些朋友随季节离去，而另外一些则伴我们度过美好的季节。

9.A true friend is someone you can disagree with and still remain friends. For if not， they weren‘t true friends in the first place.(Sandy Ratliff)真朋友是可以与你有不同见解的，如果不是，首先就不是真朋友。

10.True friendship is felt， not said.(Mariecris Madayag)朋友是说不出的感觉。

11.Friends are like stars，you don‘t always see them， but you know they‘re always there.(Hulali Luta)朋友是感觉不到的存在。

12.Memories last forever， never do they die. Friends stay together， never say goodbye.(Melina Campos)记忆永不死，朋友永不说再见。

Health 健康篇

13.light heart lives long.( William Shakespeare ， British dramatist)豁达者长寿(英国剧作家莎士比亚。 W.)

14.Early to bed and early to rise ， makes a man healthy ， wealthy and wise.(Benjamin Franklin ， American president )早睡早起会使人健康、富有和聪明。 (美国总统 富兰克林。B.)

15.The first wealth is health 。( Ralph Waldo Emerson ， American thinker)健康是人生第一财富。 (美国思想家爱默生。 R. W.)

命题作文是各类作文的根。下面是小编整理中考命题作文写作指导，欢迎阅读。

一、审题

通常可以从以下方面入手

一要抓住题目中的“题眼”，即标题中的关键词，这是最为重要的一环;如四川乐山2006年全命题的题目是“我最爱这里的风景”。程度副词“最”在这里就是关键词语。必须通过比较，以突出“爱”之“最”。例如有位考生把“我最爱这里的风景”定位在柳，开篇就旁及其它植物：“我校的风景很美。松柏常青，夏荷婀娜，柳树成阴，钻天杨挺拔。周敦颐笔下‘出淤泥而不染’的莲花使我喜欢，茅盾所写的质朴的白杨叫我赞叹，陶铸赞颂的坚挺无畏的松树同样令我敬佩，但我由衷喜欢的风景却是被人们称做‘弱女子’的柳树。”这里，“最”字已经呼之欲出;接着文章从柳是“绿得最早的春色”、“黄得最晚的生命”、“最具有热爱母亲的情怀”等三个方面进行描述，在比较中一个“最”字贯穿始终，准确地演绎了文题。如果像有的考场作文那样就柳写柳，无所旁及，那就误为“我爱这里的风景”，偏离了题意。

二要注意题目中的前缀或后缀，即标题中的限制词和修饰语。如：“行动的力量”，(江苏淮安卷)要突出表现“行动”一词给我们的力量。再如《一个会变的人》，要扣住“会变”，或写不同时期的“变”，或写不同环境下的变，都算切题。

三要深入分析题目中的“言外之意”，理解题目语言中所包含的象征义、比喻义、引申义。如“生活中的一朵浪花”，(四川眉山卷)就是一个比喻义很强的考题，“一朵浪花”，既可以理解为一件事、一种感情，也可以理解为一处景观、一次误会。

四是要审准材料选择的切入口。命题作文比话题作文的审题要求高，命题作文动笔前，把握题意、找准切入口十分重要。如福州泉州“和父母交朋友”这一题目，审题时必须明白：人物是“我”和“父母”，主题是“交朋友”，这就排除了“交朋友”的其他人物和生活琐事，文中的“朋友”具有特殊的身份，这就决定了切入口应定在与父母之间的交流、理解、包容、互尊互爱等情感因素上，在这个前提下，再确定文章的创新点。

五是指审题时把题中有些关键词的语法意义作一番自我诠释，体会清楚后，再用来指导构思立意。例如2006年江苏省无锡市考题“门其实开着”中的“其实”指什么?有什么语法意义?此时你应该迅速搜索库存信息，得出下列认识：“其实”一词在语境中能承接上文，但和上文的意思往往相反，有修正、更正或补充的作用。明白了这些，你在构思时就会明确自己的文章中需要“修正”、“更正”或“补充”的内容是什么，也即“其不实”的情节有哪些，然后才能够通过“其实”转折，由“其不实”过渡到“其实”，造成结构上的跌宕波澜。如果你丢掉了前面的审视诠释，那你就可能把“门其实开着”

写成“门开着”或“门”。如有位考生设计的情节：“参加网页制作比赛——家长、同学都支持——自己努力练习——夺得第一名——成功的门其实开着”。这位考生在进入成功之“门”前，有没有遭遇曲折?有没有犹豫动摇?有没有灰心丧气?这一切都没有写，这就写成了“门开着”。文章的整个过程没有触及“修正、更正或补充”的内在联系，结构上平铺直叙，波澜不惊，“其实”所包含的内在意义没有体现，显然偏离了题意。

六是把有些关键词放到特定的语言环境中考察，明确其适用环境和内在联系。例如2006年西宁的全命题作文题是“这里的景物也美丽”，这种用副词“也”的作文题，我们可以用代号恢复其语境：“A——d，B也d”。这里，“A”“B”表示两种事物，“d”表示其共有属性。“A”是一般性、公认性的，“B”则须具有特例性、创意性，选择B往往带有某种哲理色彩。例如“收获是享受，付出也是享受”，“成功者美丽，跌倒者也美丽”。这一题中的“景物”如写“荷花”、“菊花”就不对了，因为它们都有美的公认性，写不起眼的花草才符合题意。当然也可以写“虚”的景物，虚景也要具有特例性，创意性。

在考场上，有些题目题意明确，我们能迅速地把握命题者的意图，如：“孝敬父母二三事”(湖北省恩施卷)、“生活中的一朵浪花”(四川省眉山卷)等。也有些题目题意比较隐蔽，需要我们认真思考，才能挖掘出命题者的用意，如：“门其实开着”(江苏省无锡卷)、“印象”(辽宁省大连卷)等;还有些考卷的命题者设计了导语或提示语，让你有所感悟，打开思路，在做这类作文的时候，要读懂提示语的含义，才能有感而发。对于不同的命题，我们可以采取不同的审题策略。

①有些题目，命题者故意藏头去尾，使题目带有迷惑性，增加审题难度，用以考查学生思维的深刻性和敏捷性。如《心愿》这个题目，具有一定的迷惑性，审题有难度。对于这类题目，我们可以采用在原题的前面加上“我”、“妈妈”、“班主任”等因素，使题目成为《我的心愿》、《妈妈的心愿》、《班主任的心愿》等，这样，题目的意思就明确了，文章体裁也就很容易确定了。

②另一些带有比喻或象征性的题目，如《暖流》、《春风》等，则可以采用配方的方法。如果题目出的是比喻的喻体，写作时就配上本体去写;如果题目出的是象征性的事物，就配上被象征性的事物去写，如《暖流》，暖流是喻体，我们在写作时就可以从它的本体——同学的帮助、老师的关爱等角度去审题，中心就一目了然了。《春风》、《考试》、《蜡烛》、《七月如火》等一类题目都有可以采用配方的方法去审题。

③对于一些抽象性的题目，如《责任》、《追求》、《宽容》、《合作》、《友善》等，它们如果写成记叙文，你可以构思成“通过一个我看到(听到，读到)的有关×××人(负或不负)责任(宽容、友善……)的故事，告诉大家生活需要……”这时，题目“责任(宽容……)”就是你的记叙文的中心思想所在。如果你熟读古今中外书籍，拥有大量事例史实，擅长写议论文，你当然可以把它写成议论文，此时，题目就是你的议论的话题所在，就是议论文三要素中的论点的中心词，你只需罗列古今中外几个有关“责任”(宽容……)的事例，证明一下“责任大于山”，“勇于承担责任是每个人最基本的道德品质”，“我们要对自己、家庭、国家负起应有的责任”等论点。

二命题作文写作注意事项

命题作文虽然题目唯一，但要写出新颖的好文章，还要注意以下几点：

1. 审题要准

审题如同下棋，一着不慎，满盘皆输，可见审题是多么重要。命题作文，审题应当做到：

(1)辨明文体

虽然现在多数命题作文不限定文体，但有时，文章的文体又是固定的，因此，辨明文体就十分重要。一般情况下，一个文题只有一种适合它的文体。审题的第一步是判断文体。判断文体应注意以下规律：(1)记叙文文题的字面一般对记叙文的六要素有所涉及。题目当中直接带有：“人”、“事”、“记”等字样,就更是记叙文的标志了。(2)议论文文题中经常会有“议”、“论”、“谈”、“辩”等字眼，也有的由“......的启示”、“从......想到的”、“由......说起”等短语构成。

(2)要看清题目要求

一般中考作文题都在“要求”一项里对文体、字数、表达方式等作出了明确的规定，必须把“要求”这项内容搞清楚,并且严格执行不能遗忘。

(3)注意题目中的隐含内容。考题中明确提出的要求是一望而知的，必须照办无误，但有些要求是隐含在表面文字背后的，需要我们自己悟出来。比如《在阳光下成长》中的阳光，当然不是指自然界的阳光，应理解为党的关怀、集体的温暖、家人朋友间的亲情等等。对一些给材料作文题目中提供的材料，更应当注意运用概括、引申、类比等方法，加以认真分析，理解题目的比喻或象征意义。

(4)弄清题目的限制和要求

命题作文常对文体、时间、地点、数量和叙述的对象及其关系、内容等有限制，弄清楚了这些，就好确定作文的选材范围。如：题目“校园新风”.写记叙文，可写人也可写事，地点要在校园内，内容为好的现象，宜与过去对比。

(5)抓住“题眼”确定中心

题目中的关键词语.就是命题作文的“题眼”。扣住了“题眼”也就抓住了重点，抓住了中心。①单词语题目，题目即“题眼”，如“沟通”、“生日”等。②词组型题目中.起修饰作用的词语是“题眼”，动词是“题眼”。如“难忘的一件事”的“题眼”是“难忘”.“骄傲的妈妈”的“题眼”是“骄傲”，“这件事教育了我”的“题眼”是“教育”，“我喜欢那句格言”的“题眼”是“喜欢”.“回忆我的同桌”的“题眼”是“回忆”。

(6)添枝加叶法与逆向选材法

命题作文题目越长越容易迅速确定立意与选材。当题目是一个词时，选材的范围很宽.确定写作目标就显得困难.这时你可以采取题目添枝加叶法迅速确定写作目标，如“选择”，可在其前添加“爸爸的”、“痛苦的”、“明智的”等，或在其后添加“了坚强”、“了诚实”、“的快乐”、“的艰难”等。这种添枝加叶是在心中进行的，千万不要换题目哟!有人认为选材不应放在审题中进行，其实审题与选材应是同步完成的，它们可以相互印证。选材平庸的作文难成好文章。那么在选材中我们可以采用逆向选材法使所选材料新颖.如“感谢”.学生感谢老师为常见，老师感谢学生就为奇、为新。

(7)尽量把内容落实到人、事、物上

有些命题作文规定文体，按文体写即可：有些命题作文让自选文体，每当此时有些同学就无所适从。多是成段的感慨.而没有实际的内容。此时应依据自己对题目的理解选择擅长的文体。选择了记叙文，就要把内容落实到人、事、物上.把人写好.把事写实。若从自己或身边的生活实际中难以开发出动人的故事.写一篇小说也不失为一种聪明的选择。若选择议论文，自己要有充足的事实和理论依据。

2. 选材要新

为了使命题作文的选材新颖，我们在写作中必须遵循以下三条原则：

(1)材料真实

“真实”是指选择材料的内容必须真实可信。它要求我们选择的自己熟悉的真实材料行文，才能写出真情实感。但一些同学总喜欢在作文中胡编滥造。如写《逆境》的作文题目，就可能有60%的同学会在作文中写自己从小是个残废的孩子，没有胳膊或没有腿”。或者说“我从小就死了爸爸，13岁又死了妈妈，自己跟着70多岁的爷爷一起生活”等。像这种类似的编叙故事的现象，在作文写作中不胜枚举。这类作文不是从作者生活中来的真实事，所以在写作中，往往漏洞百出，给阅卷人一种被戏弄的感觉。其实，我们生活中深入参与生活，并在作文中将自己身边发生的真实故事写出来，就能写出真情实感来。

(2)材料新颖

作文写作中，我们要做到：“人无我有、人有我新、人新我奇。”这里讲的就是话题作文的新颖选材。现在，在中学生作文中，有一种不好的现象，那就是不管是写人还是写事，高中生就写初中时期的人和事;初中生就写小学时期的事。在文章的选材上，可通过以下两方面达到创新：一是与时俱进，尽量写新近发生的真实典型的事件，以增强文章的鲜活性。二是拓宽思路，使文章以新以奇打动读者。如上面的文章，我们就可以写感激某一件事、感激某一物、感激某一次机遇、感激某一次相逢、感激失败、感激贫困、感激挫折等，通过拓宽思路，文章的选材就新颖了。

(3)材料典型

“典型”指材料有代表性，能以一当十，说服力强。新颖的材料不一定具备典型性，即使是新颖的材料，如果不具备典型性，选择时也不能用。典型材料来源于对生活的观察和理解。例如，我们以《三峡移民人家》为题写篇文章，如果我们不深入移民中间去，就很难了解移民的思想状况、生活情况，如果盲目去写人人都有“舍小家、顾大家、主动移民为国家”的高尚思想，个个都乐于移民，就不是三峡移民的真实写照，就不具有典型性。如果我们深入到移民中去，就会发现许多移民都是由“不想移”到“主动移”的，这样去写，就具有典型性、代表性了。

3. 立意要奇

命题作文的立意是命题作文创新的关键。经过多年作文教学实践，我认为话题作文立意创新可从如下几方面去尝试：

(1)转换角度、质疑传统

“转换角度、质疑传统”是指写作中换一个角度去思考问题，去对传统已成定论的观点、看法的质疑、反叛。长期以来，我们的教育模式让我们形成了总喜欢从正面去认识事物的习惯。如说到“愚公”，我们总喜欢去赞美他的勤劳、持之以恒的美德;说到邹忌，总喜欢去赞美他的“讽齐王纳谏”的功劳等等。由于老师这么教，我们这么学，作文自然也就这么写，其结果往往就会写出千人一面，百口同腔的文章，使文章索然无味。有句诗说“横看成岭侧成峰”。对一件事物(或一个人)，我们如果放弃正面的思考，转换一个角度，从反面或侧面去思考，就会实现创新。比如，我们为何不可以去透视愚公的破坏环境，去直击邹忌的护短内心呢?

(2)转换角色、反客为主

在这世界上，我们人类总喜欢把自己当着世界的主人，把动物、植物当着我们的附属物，试想，如果我们在作文中将自己和周围一切的主客关系交换一下，并写出来，结果又如何呢?我敢肯定会大受欢迎的。《西游记》就成功地刻画了一个猴子孙悟空的形象;《聊斋志异》成功地刻画了狐仙鬼怪的形象等。这些就是反客为主的成功典范。如果让我们写《我是图书》的文章，将自己反串成图书，以第一人称的手法，通过图书的所见所闻所感来刻画阅览者的形象，批判了一些道貌岸然的人不爱惜书、偷书、撕书的丑恶行为，赞扬了爱爱惜图书的优良品质。使文章塑造出新的形象，从而给人以新颖之感。

(3)想象幻想、合情合理

想象是创新的翅膀。合情合理的想象幻想是作文实现创新的一个重要途径。

以上三点，是命题作文在立意选材方面的应该掌握的一些方法，希你在作文写作和复习中认真领会、认真揣摩，写出最好的文章来。

导语：写作文要创新，要出彩，切忌重复过去，切忌重复别人。下面是小编整理的小升初观察作文写作方法，有需要的小伙伴快来吧!

观察作文，又叫素描作文，是中年级作文的主要训练形式。在教学中，永春县桃城镇桃溪小学周淑印老师采用三步训练法，紧紧围绕“认真看，仔细想，善比较，悟道理”十二字，指”十二字，指导学生写好观察作文。

第一步：以观察室内静物为主，注意观察顺序和观察重点，培养学生想象能力

如指导学生观察教室的摆设情况，写静态片断，要求学生做到：认真看，按方位顺序，把教室的摆设和布置一件一件说清楚。

学生观察口述后，要求学生仔细想——发挥联想和想象，把事物写具体，然后把下面两段短文进行比较，从中悟出写作方法。如：我们的教室在图书楼下，正面墙上挂着国旗，国旗下面是黑板……

我们的教室在图书楼下第一间，教室宽敞明亮，干净整洁，正面墙上挂着一面鲜艳的国旗。每当我抬头看到国旗，心中就肃然起敬，它是千百万革命先烈用鲜血染成的，它激励着我们为祖国美好未来而努力学习……

通过比较，学生明白：静态片断描写要抓住事物特征，运用数字，写出静物的形状、颜色等，只要注意发挥联想和想象，就能把事物写得具体生动些。

第二步：扩大观察范围，从室内到室外，由静到动，从颜色、形状、大小到发展变化，从看、听、想等方面写动态片断

如指导写“初冬到了，天气一天天寒冷”片断，可让学生利用课余时间观察初冬树木的变化，然后写在本子上，在课堂上念给大家听。如一个学生这样写：“一阵秋风刮来，树叶沙沙直响，几片黄叶飘飘悠悠掉下来。我往地下一看，爸爸昨天扫得干干净净的院子，今天又撒下许多树叶……”有的学生还能与其它树进行比较，并写进心里想的话。如：“……只有松树、柏树，它们不怕寒冷，还那么青绿，屹立在严寒之中。我想我也要像松柏那样，不怕寒冷……”

写动态片断，要注意观察事物发展变化过程，如写“春雾”片断，向学生提供观察提纲，提醒学生有顺序有重点地进行观察：①太阳出来前后，春雾怎样?(形状、颜色、飘动)②春雾中的景物和人们怎样?通过仔细观察，大部分学生能按观察顺序写下来。如：“春天的一个早晨，我打开门，一股寒冷潮气迎面扑来。原来天下大雾啦!那灰蒙蒙的大雾，像一个巨大的纱罩，把地上的一切都蒙住了。公路上，人们在雾中行走，真像电影里的神仙在天际遨游。不远处的自行车，只听到铃声，却看不到影子。汽车也不得不打开黄车灯，不停地按着喇叭缓缓前进。

第三步：观察人物的外貌和动作

在指导观察人物外貌时的做法是

(1)教给人物外貌基本写法：①抓住人物外貌主要特征;②按一定顺序写;③通过比喻等修辞手法把外貌写具体。

(2)人物外貌素描。由教师或选班上一位学生当模特，用教师教给的写法，进行素描，然后上台念给同学听，进行评价。

(3)猜谜活动。选校内一名教师或班上一名同学进行具体描绘，不要写出名字，写好上台念，让同学猜他(她)是谁，猜对说明写得好。

指导写人物行动时的做法

(1)教给人物行动基本写法：①抓住人物主要动作;②按人物动作先后顺序;③准确选择动词。

(2)由教师演示动作，如批改作业，炒鸡蛋等，让学生素描。

(3)让学生回忆扫地、洗碗、做作业等动作，按顺序写。

3、中心要新颖。要善于从多层次、多角度、多方面来考察材料，做到以小见大，由表及里，从中深深地挖掘出他人从未曾发现的新的思想内容。

确定中心思想，有的可直接从题目中看出，如《勤俭节约的奶奶》、《我爱家乡的秋天》等题目作文，确定中心思想必须符合题目的要求。有的作文题目设有直接规定中心思想，但是规定了确定中心思想大致的范围，如《一次有意义的活动》、《这件事教育了我》等题目，确定中心思想比前一种情况有较大的自由，但也必须受规定的范围的限制。有的作文题目完全没有涉及中心思想，而只规定了在什么范围里选择写作的材料，如《课间十分钟》《我的爸爸》等题目，但要避免中心思想不明确的毛病。

1、根据下面所给材料，请你确定文章的中心思想。

李明在运动会比赛的前一天身体不舒服，老师、家长、同学都劝他不要跑了，可他坚持参加。比赛中，李明被其他运动员远远地甩在后边，但他仍顽强地跑完了全程。

2、给下面的作文题目分类，看看哪些题目直接规定了中心思想;哪些题目规定了中心思想的大致范围;哪些题目完全没有涉及中心思想。

(1)记一次公益劳动

(2)书，我的好朋友

(3)生日

(4)我的小黑板

(5)一个助人为乐的人

(6)春游南北湖

清明，是24节气之一，是中国的流传千年传统节日，我想，在每一个人的心中，它都有着不一样的含义。它的由来很耐人寻味。

Qingming Festival, is one of the 24 solar terms, is Chinas thousands of years of traditional festivals, I think, in each persons heart, it has a different meaning. Its origins are quite afford much food for thought.

清明节与春秋五霸晋文公重耳有关。重耳耳垂大，肋骨是连在一起的，一只眼睛里有两个眸子。晋国内乱，公子夷吾和重耳逃亡在外。公子夷吾杀太子自封晋惠公，对他更加无礼，重耳只好带着狐偃、狐毛、介子推等人去投奔齐国，在途中公子重耳因连日吃野草，发病了，奄奄一息，可在荒山野岭中哪有大夫?为了就自己主公，介子推割下身上的一块大腿肉生火做汤，把肉汤送给重耳，他的病好了。

The Qingming Festival is associated with the spring and Autumn Annals chonger. One ear, the ribs are linked together, one eye in two eyes. The civil strife, Wu and his son in exile. Who killed the prince - Wu Jin Hui Gong, more rude to him, he had to take the Huyan, fox fur, Jie et al to Qi, on the way to one of the princes due to days of eating weeds, disease, be at ones last gasp, but in the wild hills where the doctor? In order to his master, the muon push to cut a piece of thigh meat fire off the soup, broth gave Chonger, his disease.

他到了秦国，在秦穆公的帮助下回了晋国做了晋文公，国家建立之后，晋文公把手下的有功之臣都封了官，有人告诉他那肉汤是介子推的肉，说重耳忘记给介子推封官了。于是他后悔忘了给介子推封，可是现在六部的尚书都有人做了，他去请介子推去做官，谁知介子推隐居绵山，文公不忘本，就亲自去绵山请他，但是就是找不到他。

He went to Qin, Qin Mugong help next time in the Jin Jin, after the establishment of Jin State, his meritorious official seal, someone told him that the broth is muon push meat, that he forgot to give demonstration of the muon push. So he regrets that he forgot to muon push email, but now six of the book is done, he went to please muon push an official, who knows the meson pushes in Mianshan, Wen did not forget, then went Mianshan to please him, but I could not find him.

有人出了一个馊主意：烧山必他出来。但是介子推和老母就是不出来，后来两个人抱着两棵老柳烧死了。文公命一看追悔莫及，下令举国哀悼介子推，把绵山重新命名介山，规定每年的这一天全国不许用火，并要插柳，还将4月5号命名为清明，又称寒食节。

Someone out of a bad idea: burning mountain will him out. But Jie Zitui and mother is not out, then two people holding the two old tree willow. Wen Gongs life at her mourning, ordered the muon push, to rename the Mianshan medium mountain, stipulated every year on this day the no fire, and must be inserted Liu, also named April 5th as the Qingming Festival, also known as.

两千年来，我们中国人很重视这个节日，在清明节这一天家家不动火，只吃一些隔天的菜或青团之类的。近来我国又把它定为法定假日。让人们有时间去祭祖、扫墓、踏青。

In two thousand years, we the Chinese people attach great importance to this holiday, during the Ching Ming Festival this day every family does not get angry, just eat some vegetables such as green or the next day. Recently, our country had made it a statutory holiday. Give people time to worship ancestors, sweep the tombs, outing.

清明节，标示着中国千百年来的一个传统，说明中国人是讲义气的，重感情的，中国人有恩不忘。

The Qingming Festival, marked by a tradition for thousands of years in China, shows that the Chinese people is the sense of obligation, the feelings of the Chinese people did not forget, grace.

怎样提高自己的写作能力一直是大家所烦恼的一个问题，小编收集了确认主题作文，欢迎阅读。

作文在中考语文试卷所占比重之大是人皆共知的，其得分直接影响着中考语文成绩，一篇好的作文得分能在48分以上，而一篇较差的作文得分可能不足30分，要想使中考作文取得一个令人满意的成绩，做到以下几个方面是至关重要的：

思想内容深刻是作文得分关键。今年我市高分作文大多是内容丰富，见解深刻的作文，考生或阐述对生活的感悟，或表达自己对生活独到的见解;而那些得分较低的考生作文，内容则显得空洞贫乏，缺少实实在在的内涵，仅仅是凑一些字数，敷衍成一篇非常乏味的“政治式论述题”。因此考生在写作文时一定要结合自己的实际生活阅历，运用自己的眼光去深入思考、提炼作文的主题，表达自己的生活感悟，展示自己的思想境界，写出一篇实实在在的文章，切不可蜻蜓点水一带而过，更不可架空文章。

结构完整，这是中考作文最基本的要求。一篇未及完篇的作文，无论语言多么优美，观点如何新颖，也只能归入三类卷，所以在中考作文时一定要避免无结尾作文的出现。如果实在没有时间，也应结合作文的开头急就一个作文结尾。

其次，作文一定要做到主题集中，作文应围绕同一主题作深入阐述，切忌东拉西扯，主题涣散甚至无主题。

另外，作文篇幅也应控制在600~700字之间，作文太短了，会让人觉得内容单薄，太长了又会让人感到厌烦。

要想在众多的考生作文中脱颖而出，赢得阅卷老师的青睐，作文切入角度的新颖不失为一条行之有效的途径。今年我省的中考作文为半命题作文，大部分的考生都是从题目的提示语中选择一个词语填入题中，如写珍惜拥有的“亲情”、“青春”、“幸福”等，这样的文题当然可以，但写的人多了，阅卷者难免会觉得乏味，如果作文语言不是很精彩，那么你的作文就很难得到高分。但有些考生就很聪明，他们舍弃了这些考生常用的话题，而另辟蹊径，有的写珍惜拥有的“挫折”，有的写珍惜拥有的“对手”等，这样新颖别致的文题就很能引起阅卷老师的注意，如果言之成理或描述得当，则很容易得高分。

从两则材料中可以概括出两个看似矛盾实则不矛盾的观点：一切都会过去;一切都不会过去。首先要思考现实生活中哪些东西可以让其过去，如人生的痛苦、心灵的创伤、一段不如意的生活境遇等都可以让其过去，，从而以一种乐观的心态来对待人生。其次要思考哪些东西是不会过去的，如流传千古的文章、思想、文明的碎片等，都会穿越历史时空，影响一个民族，甚至全人类，因此，对于这些东西，要珍惜，要保护，要传承。据此，我们根据第一则材料可以得出“一切都会过去，包括苦难、痛苦等，所以我们要乐观面对生活，珍惜现在”的立意;根据第二则材料可以得出“虽然时间会泯灭一切，但精华永存”的立意;而综合分析两则材料，会得出“逝去与永恒”这一立意，此为最佳立意。

议论要切中要害，始终紧扣论点，不游离于论点之外，不偷换论题。离开论点的论述，是无从谈及论证深刻的。小编收集了议论文的论证写作技巧，欢迎阅读。

一、透过现象看本质

钱钟书先生在《论快乐》一文中是这样论述的：先引述《西游记》里小猴子对孙行者说“天上一日，下界一年”，借天上比人间活得舒服快乐，来说明快乐是人的一种心理。然后宕开一笔，“永远快乐”不但渺茫得不能实现，并且荒谬得不能成立。继而论述“快乐”在人生里好比引诱小孩子吃药的方糖，更像跑狗场里引诱狗赛跑的电兔子”，生动形象地说明了快乐在人生中的作用。接着指出：“把快乐分成肉体和精神两种是最糊涂的分析”，一切快乐的享受都属于精神的。最后归纳指出，发现快乐是由精神来决定的，它是人类史的又进一步。假如，我们来谈快乐，你会怎样论证呢?你能透过生活现象挖掘出“快乐这一习见现象的本质吗?

二、揭示问题找诱因

世界是由互相联系的事物构成的，生活中发生的事存在着某种因果联系，在进行分论证时要揭示隐藏在事件背后的深层原因。

2005年高考优秀作文《出入红楼》有这样一段精彩的议论揭示出一部《红楼梦》倾倒几多后人，让众多专家学者倾其毕生精力，还不能尽得其珍的原因：

《红楼梦》，打开了大观园的大门，让好奇的后人一窥当年封建王朝奢华辉煌的殿堂;曹公才华横溢，诗词歌赋信手拈来，如粒粒明珠嵌入其中;建筑设计侃侃而出，几笔勾出一个金碧辉煌的大观园，饮食医理无一不通，衣饰礼仪无一不全，洋洋洒洒如数家珍。曹公秉世之才，堪称语言大师。披阅十载，呕心沥血，字字看来皆是血泪，达到刘勰所说“句有可削，足见其疏;字不得减，乃知其密”中真正的惜墨如金的境界。

现实生活中会有诸多的现象发生，如少男少女染发烫发，追逐明星，超现实消费，你能透过这些现象揭示出产生这些现象的心理诱因吗?

三、抓住要害开药方

议论要切中要害，始终紧扣论点，不游离于论点之外，不偷换论题。例如，以“跨越性格的障碍”为话题，就要紧扣“性格障碍”——不健全的性格(自我封闭，不善交流沟通，缺乏团队协作精神，孤芳自赏等性格缺陷)会影响我们的终生发展。有的同学大谈挑战逆境如何超越自我的问题，没有抓住论点。因此，离开论点的论述，是无从谈及论证深刻的。

抓住要害还要从若干现象的分析中，总结出一般规律，并指出解决问题的办法。司马光在《训俭示康》中，以父亲的身份，向儿子进行节俭教育。文中有道理分析，更有大量的出国留学网具体事例，摆事实，讲道理。正反论述，有很强的说服力。文中批判“走卒类士服，夫蹑丝履”虽有封建等级的观念和鄙视劳动人民的思想局限，但他总结出的“由俭入奢易，由奢入俭难”的规律是何其深刻!

四、运用辩证明事理

辩证法告诉我们要客观地全面发展地看问题，不要主观地孤立地静止地看问题;要两点论，不要一点论;要抓住矛盾的主要方面，分清主次，不要一叶障目、不见泰山。在议论文的写作中运用辩证法认识问颢、分析问题就会有深度。又如，就“平凡与自豪”这个话题，写一篇文章。这是典型的关系型作文题，这一话题能正确引导考生认识世界，认识自我，世界是多姿多彩的;“每一滴露珠，都能反射一轮太阳”。每一个体都有其存在的意义和价值，世界不独是名人与胜者的天下。

很明显，这个作文导向是正确对待平凡，在人们的认识中，伟大与平凡是两极，平凡与平庸相等，鄙弃平凡是应该的，但只赞颂伟大而不甘于平凡，轻视平凡却是错误的。忠于职守辛勤耕耘的人，不管是名人还是农夫都是自豪的。

一、给学生创造发表园地，激发学生习作兴趣

在教学中，我们采用了发表法，即让学生的习作在课堂或墙报上得以“发表”，并经常组织学生参加各类作文竞赛，对于学生的优秀习作推荐给报刊发表。每次习作之后，我们都朗读优秀习作和片断，让学生产生一定的成功感，以激发学生写作文的兴趣，让每个学生都能积极主动地练笔，变“要我写”为“我要写”。

二、加强语言训练，让学生自己感受并积累美的语言

学生并不是有了一定的习作欲望就能把文章写好，而实际情况往往是这样：学生胸中有话，胸中有情，却不能用恰当的语言准确表达出来，词是句子的组成单位，句意表达是否正确生动、恰如其分，依赖于词语是否准确。因此，在语文课教学中，我们进行了切实到位的词语训练，使词语的色彩、形象、分寸感一同沉淀于学生脑海中，形成对该词语的强烈感受，这样，当遇到这种情况时，相应的词语便会在脑中凸现，准确表达的词语就会脱口而出。同时，我们还引导学生有感情地朗读课文，进行语感训练。最大限度地发挥其主观能动性，逐步积累语言，提高习作水平。

三、引导学生观察、联想，积累习作素材

学生有了强烈的作文欲望，并有了一定的语言基础，还要适时引导学生积累习作素材。

习作的素材来源于生活，要引导学生细致观察生活的点点滴滴，习作时才有话可说，并且要善于联想：即从眼前看到的事物、出现的景象，想象到曾经见到的、听到的、感受到的另一个事物，取其彼此相似点或相同点，由此及彼，生发开去，进行想象思维的培养。比如，看到园丁在修枝剪叶，就联想到教师的教书育人;由蜜蜂采蜜联想到农民的辛勤劳动……细心观察，善于联想，就会有取之不尽的习作素材。

四、引导学生正确选材

在习作教学中，我们采取步步引导、层层深入的方法，不仅提高了学生的习作水平，而且培养了学生良好的学习习惯和思维品质。

写简单的议论文来阐明自己的观点，应当说出持这种观点的理由和根据。阐明观点的理由和根据，一般有两种办法：一是摆事实；二是讲道理。用事实来阐明观点，事实必须确凿，有代表性，能够正确反映事物的本质。事实可以是一个，也可以是几个。不必面面俱到，要写得概括简明。用道理作论据，特别是引用革命导师、先贤和名人的有关论述，一定要持严肃的科学态度，不可有错漏，更不能断章取义。

这两种方法常结合使用。在运用事实阐明观点时，也要讲道理，要在举例的基础上加以分析；在用道理阐明观点时，也要联系实际，避免空发议论。

2.写作提示

（1）注意将摆事实、讲道理结合运用，避免空发议论和以例代理。

(2)掌握议论文的基本写作技法，即运用事例论证、说理论证、引用论证等方法来证明观点。

3.修改重点

议论文的基本要素；运用事实和讲道理的和谐搭配。

4.习作提示

一题： 讨论：你认为当今最值得发扬和提倡的传统美德是什么？要求用摆事实讲道理的方法说得让人信服。注意观点正确，有自己的见解。

提示：中华民族的传统美德有这些: 父慈子孝，兄弟友爱；为人谦和，礼貌待人；诚实可信，知恩图报；爱国爱民，心忧天下；克己奉公，廉洁公正；修身养性，君子慎独；见利思义，以义制利；勤劳俭朴，艰苦奋斗；质朴求实，宽容大度；勇敢刚毅，身体力行

一、要观察景物变化的全过程。从开始到最后，凡有变化的都要细致观察。比如植物，它的发芽、开花、结果等各个生长期都有不同的特点，如果细致观察了全过程，就容易抓住它的特征进行描述。

二、捕捉景物的颜色和姿态。自然界的颜色是七彩的，自然界的万物是各具形态的。我们在观察时，就要善于捕捉到景物的颜色和姿态。

三、调动各种感觉器官来观察。有一则寓言：一天，五种器官相互争吵起来。“眼睛”瞪得圆圆地说：“没有我，你们什么也看不见!”“耳朵”不服气地说：“少了我，你们啥也听不见!”“鼻子”哼了一声：“要是没了我，你们能闻见花的芳香?”“舌头”伸得长长地说：“嘻!如果不是我，你们能尝到美味佳肴?”“身体”在一旁发起抖来。“眼睛”好奇地问：“你怎么啦?”“身体”说：“听你们这样争吵，我浑身冷飕飕的，――不知你们想过没有，要是我们互不相让，各自离散，那我们还有什么存在的价值呢?”这个寓言形象地表明一个道理：当人们观察景或物时，需要多种器官的配合。借助“五官”，往往能描绘出景物的特点。

世界上的景和物是丰富多采的，如果“眉毛胡子一把抓”，将它们都写进文章里，那样的文章肯定是繁杂冗长，不知所云。正确的做法应该是：根据中心思想的需要，有选择、有重点地状物绘景，这样笔力集中，便于写得细腻，写得丰满。围绕中心，状物写景，不是说和中心思想关系密切的就写，和中心思想关系间接的就不写。对于那些与中心思想关系密切的景或物要重点写，和中心思想关系间接的也要写，只是笔墨轻一点罢了。当然，对于那些和中心思想毫无关系的景或物，应当一律舍弃。

游踪，就是游览一个地方所经过的路线、踪迹。浏览一个地方，往往要经过许多地方，看到许多景物。行文的时候必须按照游览先后顺序记叙，清楚地交代先到了什么地方，后到了什么地方。准确地把游踪写清楚，才能够具体描述景物所处的地点、方位、特征。写清楚游踪的主要途径是“移步换景”，即随着游览、参观者的立足点不断转移，相应描述不同地点所见的景物。通过“移步换景”，游览、参观的游踪，景物的位置，景物和景物之间的空间关系，都容易描述清楚。作者如同一名导游，领着读者一个点、一个点地游览、参观。为了使状物绘景更生动、更具体、更形象，我们还可以采用多种表现手段来丰富描写，从而增添文章的情趣。常见的表现手段主要是：

一、用比喻等手法状物绘景。

着名作家老舍先生说过：“在描写时，不能不设喻。”确实这样，只有通过比喻，才能把简单的东西具体化，抽象的东西形象化。比如作者把稻穗的颜色比作“黄金般”，就生动形象地写出丰收的景象。又如作者把耶诞红比作淑女，也生动形象地写出耶诞红的美丽。不过话要说回来，比喻也要创新。如果总把某种景物的比喻固定化，那是不会增添文章的情趣的。有个伟人说过，第一个把姑娘比作鲜花的是天才，第二个把姑娘比作鲜花的是庸才，第三个则是蠢才。恐怕他说的也是这个道理。

拟人，是把没有思想感情的生物当作有思想感情的人来写，它也往往能使语言富有魅力。例如“原野上的青草，换上青翠的衣服”，作者这样一比拟，就把春去夏来的意思委婉地表达出来。把春天人格化为“春天是个插花的能手”，“春天是个美丽活泼的仙子”，“春天是个慈祥的守护神”，“春天是一位伟大的画家”。这样状物写景，文章就更富有感染力。

二、用动静结合的手法状物绘景。

有这样一则幽默故事：“动”与“静”是一对冤家。一见面总爱吵个没完。一次，“静”对“动”说：“你怎么老跟着我?让我独自呆一会不行吗?”“动”回答：“那怎么行!没有我，人家怎么能认出你来?”“静”不服气地说：“你举例说说。”“古人笔下有这么两句诗：‘蝉噪林愈静，鸟鸣山更幽。’如果不写‘蝉噪’、‘鸟鸣’的动态，怎么能知道‘林静’‘山更幽’呢?还有……”“得了，得了!这么说，我俩是形影不离呀!”“对，互相依存，共同体现”。这个故事说明：以动写静，动静结合，这是状物绘景中高妙的一着，它能使文章情趣盎然。

三、运用传说，状物绘景。

状物写景要富有活力，运用传说也是一个重要途径。我们在描写景物时，插入一些故事逸闻、神话传说、典故名言、文史资料、民俗谚语，使景和物蒙上一层神奇的色彩，不仅能使文章内容丰富，而且能使文章情趣横生。

I have a happy family. My dad and mom love me so much.

there are six people in my family, my mom, my dad, my grandparents, my sister and me.

My dad is a boss. He is 39 years old. He’s tall and strong. He is very strict, too. He likes cars. I always goes to car show when he has time. My mom is my dad’s assistant. She is in charge of the company. She is 34 years old. She is tall, thin and very kind. She likes going shopping and reading books.

My grandfather live with us. He’s old, short， and a little bit fat. He loves us very much. He likes listening to the Yue-Opra. My grandmother lives with us, too. She is old, short, thin and very kind, too. She likes planting trees and flowers. My younger sister is only three years old. She isn’t a student. She is very lovely. She is in Media Kindergarten. She likes watching TV. I am a student of Grade Six. I study very hard now.

I love my family. My family love me, too.

【模拟文题】

一头驴子不小心掉进一口枯井里，他哀怜地叫喊求救，期待主人把它救出去。驴子的主人召集了数位亲邻出谋划策，也没能想出办法来搭救驴子。大家倒是认定，反正驴子已经老了，“人道地毁灭”也不为过，况且这口枯井迟早总要填上的。

于是，人们拿起铲子开始填井。当第一铲泥土落到枯井里时，驴子叫得更恐怖了——它显然明白了主人的意图。又一铲泥土落到枯井里，驴子却出乎意料地安静下来了。人们发现，此后，每一铲泥土打在它背上的时候，驴子都在做一件令人惊奇的事情，它努力地抖落背上的泥土，踩在脚下，把自己垫高一点。

人们不断把泥土往枯井里铲，驴子也就不停地抖落那些打在背上的泥土，使自己再升高一些。就这样驴子慢慢地升到枯井口，在人们惊奇的目光中，潇潇洒洒地走出了枯井。以上材料，引发了你怎样的思考？请以“绝境与希望”为话题写一篇文章，题目自拟，体裁不限，不少于800字。

下面的材料旨在丰富学生在是非问题写作方面的思想和语言，考生在复习时可以先分类阅读这些篇章，然后尝试写相关方面的作文题。

对于素材中用黑体字的部分，特别建议你熟读，背诵，因为它们在语言和观点上都值得吸收。学习语言的人应该明白，表达能力和思想深度都靠日积月累，潜移默化。从某种意义上说，提高英语写作能力无捷径可走，你必须大段背诵英语文章才能逐渐形成语感和用英语进行表达的能力。这一关，没有任何人能代替你过。

因此，建议你下点苦功夫，把背单词的精神拿出来背诵文章。何况，并不是要求你背了之后永远牢记在心：你可以这个星期背，下个星期忘。这没有关系，相信你的大脑具有神奇的能力。背了工具箱里的文章后，你会惊讶的发现：I can think in English now！

1.?????? Proverbs

1. A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that individuality is the key to success.

2. The primary purpose of a liberal education is to make one’s mind a pleasant place in which to spend one’s time.

3. Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither freedom nor justice can be permanently maintained.

4. The classroom--not the trench--is the frontier of freedom now and forevermore.

5. Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.

6. It is the purpose of education to help us become autonomous, creative, inquiring people who have the will and intelligence to create our own destiny.

7. You see, real ongoing, lifelong education doesn’t answer questions; it provokes them.

8. People will pay more to be entertained than educated.

9.the most important function of education at any level is to develop the personality of the individual and the significance of his life to himself and to others. This is the basic architecture of a life; the rest is ornamentation and decoration of the structure.

10. The essence of our efforts to see that every child has a chance must be to assure each as equal opportunity, not to become equal, but to become different-to realize whatever unique potential of body, mind, and spirit he or she possesses.

11. A great teacher never strives to explain his vision-he simply invites you to stand beside him and see for yourself.

12. If you can read and don’, you are an illiterate by choice.

2. Damaging Research

A study by National Parent-Teacher Organization revealed that in the average American school, eighteen negatives are identified for every positive that is pointed out. The Wisconsin study revealed that when children enter the first grade, 80 percent of them feel pretty good themselves, but by the time they get to the sixth grade, only 10 percent of them have good self-images.

3. Education and Citizenship

An important aspect of education in the United States is the relationship between education and citizenship. Throughout its history this nation has emphasized public education as a means of transmitting democratic values, creating equality of opportunity, and preparing new generations of citizens to function in society. In addition, the schools have been expected to help shape society itself. During the 1950s, for example, efforts to combat racial segregation focused on the schools. Later, when the Soviet Union launched the first orbiting satellite, American schools and colleges came under intense pressure and were offered many incentives to improve their science and mathematics programs so that the nations would not fall behind the Soviet Union in scientific and technological capabilities.

Education is often viewed as a tool for solving social problems, especially social inequality. The schools, t is thought, can transform young people from vastly different backgrounds into competent, upwardly mobile adults. Yet these goals seem almost impossible to attain. In recent years, in fact, public education has been at the center of numerous controversies arising from the gap between the ideal and the reality. Part of the problem is that different groups in society have different have different expectations. Some feel that children should be taught basic job-related skills; still others believe education should not only prepare children to compete in society but also help them maintain their cultural identity (and, in the case of Hispanic children, their language). On the other hand, policymakers concerned with education emphasize the need to increase the level of student achievement and to improve parents in their children’s education.

Some reformers and critics have called attention to the need to link formal schooling with programs designed to address social problems. Sociologist Charles Moscos, for example, is a leader in the movement to expand programs like the Peace Corps, Vista, and Outward Bound into a system of voluntary national service. National service, as Moscos defines it, would entail “the full-time undertaking of public duties by young people whether as citizen soldiers or civilian servers-who are paid subsistence wages” and serve for at least one year. In return for this period of service, the volunteers would receive assistance in paying for college or other educational expenses.

Advocates of national service and school-to-work programs believe that education does not have to be confined to formal schooling. In devising strategies to provide opportunities for young people to serve their society, they emphasize the educational value of citizenship experiences gained outside the classroom. At this writing there is little indication that national service will become a new educational institution in the United States, although the concept is steadily gaining support among educators and social critics.

4. The Teacher’s Role

Given the undeniable importance of classroom experience, sociologists have done a considerable amount of research on what goes on in the classroom. Often they start from the premise that, along with the influence of peers, students’ experiences in the classroom are of central importance to their later development. One study examined the impact of a single first-grade teacher on her students’ subsequent adult status. The surprising results of this study have important implications. It is evident that good teachers can make a big difference in children’s lives, a fact that gives increased urgency to the need to improve the quality of primary-school teaching. The reforms carried out by educational leaders like James Comer suggest that when good teaching is combined with high levels of parental involvement the results can be even more dramatic.

Because the role of the teacher is to change the learner in some way, the teacher-student relationship is an important part of education. Sociologists have pointed out that this relationship is asymmetrical or unbalanced, with the teacher being in a position of authority and the student having little choice but to passively absorb the information provided by the teacher. In other words, in conventional classrooms there is little opportunity for the students to become actively involved in the learning process. On the other hand, students often develop strategies for undercutting the teacher’s authority: mentally withdrawing, interrupting, and the like. Hence, much current research assumes that students and teachers influence each other instead of assuming that the influence is always in a single direction.

5. Education Philosophy

For the past fifty years our schools have operated on the theories of John Dewey (1859-1953), an American educator and writer. Dewey believed hat the school’s job was to enhance the natural development of the growing child, rather than to pour information, for which the child had no context, into him or her. In the Dewey system, the child becomes the active agent in his own education, rather than a passive receptacle for facts.

Consequently, American schools are very enthusiastic about teaching “life skills” –logical thinking, analysis, creative problem--solving. The actual content of the lessons is secondary to the process, which is supposed to train the child to be able to handle whatever life may present, including all the unknowns of the future. Students and teachers both regard pure memorization as an uncreative and somewhat vulgar.

In addition to “life skills”, schools are assigned to solve the ever growing stoke of social problems. Racism, teenage pregnancy, alcoholism, drug use, reckless driving, and are just a few of the modern problems that have appeared on the school curriculum.

This all contributes to a high degree of social awareness in American youngsters.

6. Student Life

To the students, the most notable difference between elementary school and the higher levels is that in junior high they start “changing classes”. This means that rather than spending the day in one classroom, they switch classrooms to meet their different teachers. This gives them three or four minutes between classes in the hallways, where a great deal of the important social action of high school traditionally takes place. Students have lockers in these hallways, around which thy congregate.

Society in general does not take the business of studying very seriously. Schoolchildren have a great deal of free time, which they are encouraged to fill with extracurricular activities—sports, clubs, cheerleading, scouts—supposed to inculcate such qualities as leadership, sportsmanship, ability to organize, etc. those who don’t become engaged in such activities or have afterschool jobs have plenty of opportunity to “hang out”, listen to teenager music, and watch television.

Compared to other nations, American students do not have much homework. Studies also show that American parents have lower expectations for their children’s success in school than other nationalities do. (Historically, there has not been much correlation between American school success and success in later life.) “He’s just not a scholar”, the American parents might say, content that their son is on the swim team and doesn’t take drugs. (Some of the young do choose to study hard, for reason of their own, such as determining that the road to riches lies through Harvard Business School.)

What American schools do effectively teach is the competitive method. In innumerable ways children are pitted against each other—whether in classroom discussion, spelling bees, reading groups, or tests. Every classroom is expected to produce a scattering of A’s and F’s (teachers often grade A=excellent; B=good; C=average; D=poor; and F=failed). A teacher who gives all A’s looks too soft—so students are aware that they are competing for the limited number of top marks.

Foreign students sometimes don’t understand that copying from other people’s papers or from books is considered wrong and taken seriously. Here, it is important to show that you have done your own work and are displaying your own knowledge. It is more important than helping your friends to pass, whom we think do not deserve to pass unless they can provide their own answers. Group effort goes against the competitive grain, and American students do not study together as many Asians do. Many Asians in this country consider their group study habits a large contributor to their school success.

7. Adult Education

After complaining about many aspects of American life, a 40-year-old woman from Hong Kong concluded, “But where else could someone my age go back to school and get a degree in social work? Here you can change your whole life, start a new business, do what you really want to do.”

So at least to this person, school requirements weren’t inhibiting. And to millions of others, adult education is the path to a new career, or if not to a new career, to a new outlook. Schools generally encourage the older person who wants to start anew, and besides regular classes, schedule evening classes in special programs. Today there are so many people of retirement age in college that it is no longer remarkable.

8. Moral Relativism in American

Improving American education requires not doing new things but doing (and remembering) some good old things. At the time of our nation’s founding, Thomas Jefferson listed the requirements for a sound education in the Report of the Commissioners for the University of Virginia. In this landmark statement on American education, Jefferson wrote of the importance of education and writing, and of reading history, and geography. But he also emphasized the need “to instruct the mass of our citizens in these, their rights, interests, and duties, as men and citizens.” Jefferson believed education should aim at the improvement of both one’s “morals” and “faculties”. That has been the dominant view of the aims of American education for over two centuries. But a number of changes, most of them unsound, have diverted schools from these great pursuits. And the story of the loss of the school’s original moral mission explains a great deal.

Starting in the early seventies, “values clarification” programs started turning up in schools all over America. According to this philosophy, the schools were not to take part in their time-honored task of transmitting sound moral values; rather, they were to allow the child to “clarify” his own values (which adults, including parents, had no “rights” to criticize). The “values clarification” movement didn’t clarify values; it clarified wants and desires. This form of moral relativism said, in effect, that no set of values was right or wrong; everybody had an equal right to his own values; and all values were subjective, relative, and personal. This destructive view took hold with a vengeance.

In 1985 The York Times published an article quoting New York area educators, in slavish devotion to this new view, proclaiming, “They deliberately avoid trying to tell students what is ethically right and wrong.” The article told of one counseling session involving fifteen high school juniors and seniors. In the course of that session a student concluded that a fellow student had been foolish to return one thousand dollars she found in a purse at school. According to the article, when the youngsters asked the counselor’s opinion, “He told them he believed the girl had done the right thing, but that, of course, he would not try to force his values on them. ‘If I come from the position of what is wrong,’ he explained, ‘then I’m not their counselor.’”

Once upon a time, a counselor offered counselor, and he knew that an adult does not form character in the young by taking a stance of neutrality toward questions of right and wrong or by merely offering “choices” or “options”.

In response to the belief that adults and educators should teach children sound morals, one can expect from some quarters indignant objections (I’ve heard one version of it expressed countless times over the years): “Who are you to say what’s important?” or “Whose standards and judgments do we use?”

The correct response, it seems to me, is, is we ready to do away with standards and judgments? Is anyone going to argue seriously that a life of cheating and swindling is as worthy as a life of honest, hard work? Is anyone (with the exception of some literature professors at our elite universities) going to argue seriously the intellectual corollary, that a Marvel comic book is as good as Macbeth? Unless we are willing to embrace some pretty silly position, we’ve got to admit the need for moral and intellectual standards. The problem is that some people tend to regard anyone who would pronounce a definitive judgment as an unsophisticated Philistine or a closed-minded “elitist” trying to impose his view on everybody else.

The truth of the real world is that without standards and judgments, there can be no progress. Unless we are prepared to say irrational things—that nothing can be proven more valuable than anything else or that everything is equally worthless—we must ask the normative question. It may come, as a surprise to those who fell that to be “progressive” is to be value-neutral. But as Matthew Amold said, “the world is forwarded by having its attention fixed on the best things” and if the world can’t decide what the best things are, at least to some degree, then it follows that progress, and character, is in trouble. We shouldn’t be reluctant to declare that some things, some lives, books, ideas, and values are better than others. It is the responsibility of the schools to teach these better things.

At one time, we weren’t so reluctant to teach them. In the mid-nineteenth century, a diverse, widespread group of crusaders began to work for the public support of what was then called the “common school”, the forerunner of the public school. They were to be charged with the mission of school felt that the nation could fulfill its destiny only if every new generation was taught these values together in a common institution.

The leaders of the common school movement were mainly citizens who were prominent in their communities—businessmen, ministers, local civic and government officials. These people saw the schools as upholders of standards of individual morality and small incubators of civic and personal virtue; the founders of the public schools had faith that public education could teach good moral and civic character from a common ground of American values.

But in the past quarter century or so, some of the so-called experts became experts of value neutrality, and moral education was increasingly left in their hands. The commonsense view of parents and the publicthat schools should reinforce rather than undermine the values of home, family, and country, was increasingly rejected.

There are those today still that claim we are now too diverse a nation, that we consist of too many competing convictions and interests to instill common values. They are wrong. Of course we are a diverse people. We have always been a diverse people. And as Madison wrote in FederalistNo.10, the competing, balancing interests of a diverse people can help ensure the survival of liberty. But there are values that all American citizens share and that we should want all American students to know and to make their own: honesty, fairness, self-discipline, fidelity to task, friends, and family, personal responsibility, love of country, and belief in the principles of liberty, equality, and the freedom to practice one’s faith. The explicit teaching of these values is the legacy of the common schools, and it is a legacy to which we must return.

9. Schools Should Teach Values

People often said, “Yes, we should teach these values, but how do we teach them?” this question deserves a candid response, one that isn’t given often enough. It is by exposing our children to good character and inviting its imitation that we will transmit to them a moral foundation. This happens when teachers and principals, by their words and actions, embody sound convictions. As Oxford’s Mary Warnock has written, “You cannot teach morality without being committed to morality yourself; and you cannot be committed to morality yourself without holding that some things are right and others wrong.” The theologian Martin Buber wrote that the educator is distinguished from all other influences “by his will to take part in the stamping of character and by his consciousness that he represents in the eyes of the growing person a certain selection of what is, the selection of what is ‘right’, of what should be.” It is in this will, Buber says, in this clear standing for something, that the “vocation as an educator finds its fundamental expression.”

There is no escaping the fact that young people need as example principals and teachers who know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad, and who themselves exemplify high moral purpose.

As Education Secretary, I visited a class at Waterbury Elementary School in Waterbury, Vermont, and asked the students, “Is this a good school?” They answered, “Yes, this is a good school.” I asked them, “Why?” Among other things, one eight-year-old said, “The principal Mr. Riegel, makes good rules and everybody obeys them.” So I said, “Give me an example.” And another answered, “You can’t climb on the pipes in the bathroom. We don’t climb on the pipes and the principal doesn’t either.”

This example is probably too simple to please a lot of people who want to make the topic of moral education difficult, but there is something profound in the answer of those children, something education should pay more attention to. You can’t expect children to take messages about rules or morality seriously unless they see adults taking those rules seriously in their day-to-day affairs. Certain must be said, certain limits lay down, and certain examples set. There is no other way.

We should also do a better job at curriculum selection. The research shows that most “values education” exercises and separate courses in “moral reasoning” tend not to affect children’s behavior; if anything, they may leave children morally adrift. Where to turn? I believe our literature and our history are a rich quarry of moral literacy. We should mine that quarry. Children should have at their disposal a stock of examples illustrating what we believe to be right and wrong, good and bad—examples illustrating what are morally right and wrong can indeed be known and that there is a difference.

What kind of stories, historical events, and famous lives am I talking about? If we want our children to know about honesty, we should teach them about Abe Lincoln walking three miles to return six cents and conversely, about Aesop’s shepherd boy who cried wolf if we want them to know about courage, we should teach them about Joan of Arc, Horatius at the bridge, and Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. If we want them to know about persistence in the face of adversity, they should know about the voyages of Columbus and the character of Washington during the Civil War. And our youngest should be told about the Little Engine That Could. If we want them to know about respect for the law, they should understand why Socrates told Crito: “No, I must submit to the decree of Athens.” If we want our children to respect the rights of others, they should read the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the Gettysburg Address, and Martin Luther King, Jr.’ “Letter from Birmingham jail.” From the Bible they should know about Ruth’s loyalty to Naomi, Joseph’s forgiveness of his brothers, Jonathan’s friendship with David, the Good Samaritan’s kindness toward a stranger, and David’s cleverness and courage in facing Goliath.

These are only a few of the hundreds of examples we can call on. And we need not get into issues like nuclear war, abortion, creationism, or euthanasia. This may come as a disappointment to some people, but the fact is that the formation of character in young people is educationally a task different from, and prior to, the discussion of the great, difficult controversies of the day. First things come first. We should teach values the same way we teach other things: one step at a time. We should not use the fact that there are many difficult and controversial moral questions as an argument against basic instruction in the subject.

After all, we do not argue against teaching physics because laser physics is difficult, against teaching American history because there are heated disputes about the Founders’ intent. Every field has its complexities and its controversies. And every field has its basics, its fundamentals. So they are too with forming character and achieving moral literacy. As any parent knows, teaching character is a difficult task. But it is a crucial task, because we want our children to be healthy, happy, and successful but decent, strong, and good. None of this happens automatically; there is no genetic transmission of virtue. It takes the conscious, committed efforts of adults. It takes careful attention.

10. College Pressures

Mainly I try to remind that the road ahead is a long one and that it will have more unexpected turns than they think. There will be plenty of time to change jobs, change careers, change whole attitudes and approaches. They don not want to hear such liberating news. They want a map—right now – that they can follow unswervingly to career security, financial security, Social Security and, presumably, a prepaid grave.

What I wish for all students is some release from the clammy grip of the future. I wish them a chance to savor each segment of their education as an experience in itself and not as a grim preparation for the next step. I wish them the right to experiment, to trip and fall, to learn that defeat is as instructive as victory and is not the end of the world.

My wish, of course, is na?ve. One of the national gods venerated in our media—the million-dollar athlete, the wealthy executive—and glorified in our praise of possessions. In the presence of such a potent state religion, the young are growing up old.

I see four kinds of pressure working on college students today: economic pressure, parental pressure, peer pressure, and self-induced pressure. It is easy to look around for villains—to blame the colleges for charging too much money, the professors for assigning too much work, the parents for pushing their children too far, and the students for driving themselves too hard. But there are no villains: only victims.

“In the late 1960s.” one dean told me. “The typical question that I got from students was ‘Why is there so much suffering in the world’ or ‘how I can make a contribution?’ Today it’s ‘Do you think it would look better for getting into law school if I did a double major in history and political science, or just majored in one of them?’” many other deans confirmed this pattern. One said: “They are trying to find an edge—the intangible something that will look better on paper if two students are about equal.”

Note the emphasis on looking better. The transcript has become a sacred document, the passport to security. How one appears on paper is more important than how one appears in person. A is for Admirable and B is for Borderline, even though, in Yale’s official system of grading, A means “excellent” and B means “very good.” Today, looking very good is no longer good enough, especially for students who hope to go on to law school or medical school. They know that entrance into the better schools will be an entrance into the better law firms and better medical practices where they will make a lot of money. They also know that the odds are harsh. Yale Law School, for instance, matriculates 170students from an applicant pool of 3,700; Harvard enrolls 550 from a pool of 7,000.

It’s all very well for those of us who write letters of recommendation for our students to stress the qualities of humanity that will make them good lawyers or doctors. And it’s nice to think that admission officers are ready reading our letters and looking for the extra dimension of commitment or concern. Still, it would be hard for a student not to visualize these officers shuffling so many transcripts studded with As that they regard a B as positively shameful.

The pressure is almost as heavy on students who just want to graduate and get a job. Long gone are the days of the “gentleman’s C.” when students journeyed through college with a certain relaxation, sampling a wide variety of courses-music, art, philosophy, classics, anthropology, poetry, religion—that would send them out as liberally educated men and women. If I were an employer I would rather employ graduates who have this range and curiosity than those who narrowly pursued safe subjects and high grades. I know countless students whose inquiring minds exhilarate me. I like to hear the play of their ideas. I do not know if they are getting As or Cs, and I do not care. I also like them as people. The country needs them, and they will find satisfying jobs. I tell them to relax. They cannot.

Nor can I blame them. They live in a brutal economy. Tuition, room, and board at most private colleges now come to at least $7,000, not counting books and fees. This might seem to suggest that the colleges are getting rich. But they are equally battered by inflation. Tuition covers only 60 percent of what it costs to educate a student, and ordinarily the remainder comes from what college receives in endowments, grants, and gifts. Now, the remainder keeps being swallowed by the cruel costs—higher every year—of just opening the doors. Heating oil is up. Insurance is up. Postage is up. Health-premium costs are up. Everything is up. Deficits are up. We are witnessing in American the creation of a brotherhood of paupers—colleges, parents, and students, joined by the common bond of debt.

Today it is not unusual for a student, even if he works part time at college and full time during the summer, to accrue $5,000 in loans after four years—loans that he must start to repay within one year after graduation. Exhorted at commencement to go forth into the world, he is already behind as he goes forth. How could he not feel under pressure throughout college to prepare for this day of reckoning? I have used “he,” incidentally, only for brevity. Women at Yale are under no less pressure to justify their expensive education to themselves, their parents, and society. In fact, they are probably under more pressure. For although they leave college superbly equipped to bring fresh leadership to traditionally male jobs, society has not yet caught up with this fact.

Along with economic pressure goes parental pressure. Inevitably, the two are deeply intertwined.

I see many students taking pre-medical courses with joyless tenacity. They go off to their labs as if they were going to the dentist. It saddens me because I know tem in other corners of their life as cheerful people.

“Do you want to medical school?” I asked them.

“I guess so,” they say, without conviction, or “Not really.”

“Then why are you going?”

“Well, my parents want me to be a doctor. They are paying all this money and …”

Poor students, poor parents, they are caught in one of the oldest webs of love and duty and guilt. The parents mean will; they are trying to steer their sons and draughts toward a secure future. But the sons and daughter want to major in history or classics or philosophy—subjects with no “practical” value. Where’s the payoff on the humanities? It’s not easy to persuade such loving parents that the humanities do indeed pay off. The intellectual faculties developed by studying subjects like history and classics—an ability to synthesize and relate, to weigh cause and effect, to see events in perspective—are just the faculties that make creative leaders in business or almost any general field. Still, many fathers would rather put their money on courses that point toward specific profession—courses that are pre-law, pre-medical, pre-business, or, as I sometimes heard it put, “pre-rich.”

But the pressure on students is severe. They are truly torn. One part of them feels obliged to fulfill their parents’ expectations; after all, their parents are older and presumably wiser. Another part tells them that the expectations that are right for their parents are not right for them.

I know a student who wants to be an artist. She is very obviously an artist and will be a good one—she has already had several modest local exhibits. Meanwhile she is growing as a well-round person and taking humanistic subjects that will enrich the inner resources out of which her art will grow. But her father is strongly opposed. He thinks that an artist is a “dumb” thing to be. The student vacillates and tries to please everybody. She keeps up with her art somewhat furtively and takes some of the “dumb” courses her father wants her to take—at least they are dumb courses for her. She is a free spirit on a campus of tense students—no small achievement in it—and she deserves to follow her muse.

Peer pressure and self-induced pressure are also intertwined, and they begin almost at the beginning of freshman year.

“I had a freshman student I’ll call Linda,” one dean told me, “who came in and said she was under terrible pressure because her roommate, Barbara, was much brighter and studied all the time. I could not tell her that Barbara had come in two hours earlier to say the same thing about Linda.”

The story is almost funny—except that it is not. It is symptomatic of all the pressure put together. When every student thinks every other student is working harder and doing better, the only solution is to study harder still. I see students going off to the library every night after dinner and coming back when it closes at midnight. I wish they would sometimes forget about their peers and go to a movie. I hear the clacking of typewriters in the hours before dawn. I see the tension in their eyes when exams are approaching and papers are due: “Will I get everything done?”

Probably they won’t. They will get blocked. They will sleep. They will oversleep. They will bug out.

Part of the problem is that they are expected to do. A professor will assign five page papers. Several students will start writing ten page papers to impress him. Then more students will write ten page papers, and a few will raise the ante to fifteen. Pity the poor student who is still just doing the assignment.

“Once you have twenty or thirty percent of the student population deliberately overexerting,” one dean points out, “It’s bad for everybody. When a teacher gets more and more effort from his class, the student who is doing normal work can be perceived as not doing well. The tactic work, psychologically.”

Why cannot the professor just cut back and not accept longer papers? He can, and he probably will. But by then the term will be half over and the damage done. Grade fever is highly contagious and not easily reversed. Besides, the professor’s main concern is with his course. He knows his students only in relation to the course and does not know that they are also overexerting in their other courses. Nor is it really his business. He did not sign up for dealing with the student as a whole person and with all the emotional baggage the student brought along from home. That’s what deans, masters, chaplains, and psychiatrists are for.

To some extent this is nothing new: a certain number of professors have always been self-contained islands of scholarship and shyness, more comfortable with books than with people. But the new pauperism has widened the gap still further, for professors who actually like to spend time with students do not have as much time to spend. They are also overexerting. If they are young, they are busy trying to publish in order not to perish, hanging by their figure nails onto a shrinking profession.

If they are old and tenured, they are buried under the duties of administering departments—as departmental chairmen or members of committees—that have been thinned out by the budgetary axe.

Ultimately it will be the students’ own business to break the circles in which they are trapped. They are too young to be prisoners of their parents’ dreams and their classmates’ fears. They must be jolted into believing into themselves as unique men and women who have the power to shape their own future.

“Violence is being done to the undergraduate experience,” says Carlos Hortas. “College should be open-ended: at the end it should open many, many roads. Instead, students are choosing their goal in advance, and their choices narrow as they go along. It’s almost as if they think that the country has been codified in the type of jobs that exist-that they’ve got to fit into certain slots. Therefore, fit into the best paying slot.”

“They ought to take chances. Not taking chances will lead to life of colorless mediocrity. They’ll be comfortable. But something in the spirit will be missing.”

I have painted too drab a portrait of today’s students, making them seem a solemn lot. That is only half of their story; if they were so dreary I wouldn’t so thoroughly enjoy their company. The other half is that they are easy to like. They are quick to laugh and to offer friendship. They are not introverts. They are usually kind and are more considerate of one another than any student generation I have known.

Nor are they so obsessed with their studies that they avoid sports and extracurricular activities. On the contrary, they juggle their crowded hours to play on a variety of teams, perform with musical and dramatic groups, and write for campus publications. But this in turn is one more cause of anxiety. There are too many choices. Academically, they have 1,300 courses to select from; outside class they have to decide how much spare time they can spare and how to spend it.

This means that they engage in fewer extracurricular pursuits than their predecessors did. If they want to row on the crew and play in the symphony they will eliminate one; in the ‘60s they would have done both. They also tend to choose activities that are self-limiting. Drama, for instance, is flourishing in all twelve of Yale’s residential colleges, as it never has before. Students hurl themselves into these productions—as actors, directors, carpenters, and technicians—with a dedication to create the best possible play, knowing that the day will come when the run will end and they can get back to their studies.

They also cannot afford to be the willing slave of organizations like the Yale Daily News. Last spring at the one-hundredth anniversary banquet of that paper—who’s past chairmen include such once and future kings as Potter Stewart, Kingman Brewster, and William F. Buckley, Jr.—much was made of the fact that the editorial staff used to be small and totally committed and that “newsies” routinely worked fifty hours a week. In effect they belonged to a club; Newsies is how they defined themselves at Yale. Today’s students will one or two articles a week, when he can, and he defines himself as a student. I’ve never heard the word Newsie except at the banquet.

If I have described the modern undergraduate primarily as a driven creature who is largely ignoring the blithe spirit inside who keeps trying to come out and play, it’s because that’s where the crunch is, not only at Yale but throughout American education. It’s why I think we should all be worried about the values that are nurturing a generation so fearful of risk and so goal-obsessed at such an early age.

I tell students that there is no one “right” way to get ahead—that each of them is a different person, starting from a different point and bound for a different destination. I tell neither them that change is a tonic and that all the slots are not codified nor the frontiers closed. One of my ways of telling them is to invite men and women who have achieved success outside the academic world to come and talk informally with my students during the year. They are heads of companies or ad agencies, editors of magazines, politicians, public officials, television magnates, labor leaders, business executives, Broadway products, artists, writers, economists, photographers, scientists, historians—a mixed bag of achievers.

I asked them to say a few words about how they got started. The students assume that they started in their present profession and knew all along that it was what they wanted to do. Luckily for me, most of them got into their field by a circuitous route, to their surprise, after many detours. The students are startled. They can hardly conceive of a career that was not pre-planned. They can hardly imagine allowing the hand of God or chance to nudge them down some unforeseen trail.

11. To Err Is Wrong

In the summer of 1979, Boston Red Sox first baseman Carl Yastrzemski became the fifteenth player in baseball history to reach the three thousand hit plateaus. This event drew a lot of media attention, and for about a week prior to the attainment of this goal, hundreds of reports covered Yaz’s every more. Finally, one reporter asked, “Hey Yaz, aren’t you afraid all of this attention will go to your head?” Yastrzemski replied, “I look at this way: in my career I’ve been up to bat over ten thousand times. That means I’ve been unsuccessful at the plate over seven thousand times. That fact alone keeps me from getting a swollen head.”?

Most people consider success and failure as opposites, but they are actually both products of the same process. As Yaz suggest, an activity that produces a hit may also produce a miss. It is the same with creative thinking; the same energy that generates good creative ideas also produces errors.

Many people, however, are not comfortable with errors. Our educational system, based on “the right answer” belief, cultivates our thinking in another, more conservative way. From an early age, we are taught that right answers are good and incorrect answers are bad. This value is deeply embedded in the incentive system used in most schools:

Right over 90% of the time = “A”

Right over 80% of the time = “B~”

Right over 70% of the time = “C~” Right over 60% of the time = “D~” Less than 60% correct, you fail.

From this we learn to be right as often as possible and to keep our mistakes to a minimum. We learn, in other words, that “to err is wrong.

Playing It Safe

With this kind of attitude, you aren’t going to be taking too many chances. If you learn that failing even a litter penalizes you (e.g., being wrong only 15% of the time garners you only a “B” performance), you learn not to make mistakes. And more important, you learn not to put yourself to situation where you might fall. This leads to conservative thought pattern designed to avoid the stigma our society puts on “failure”.

I have a friend who recently graduated from college with a Master’s degree in Journalism. For the last six month, she has been trying to find a job, but to no avail. I talked with her about situation, and realized that her problem is that she doesn’t know how to fail. She went through eighteen years of schooling to try any approaches where she might fail. She has been conditioned to believe that failure is bad in and of itself, rather than a potential stepping-stone to new ideas.

Look around. How many middle managers, housewives, administrators, teachers, and other people do you see who are to try anything new because of this failure? Most of us have learned not to make mistakes in public. As a result, we remove ourselves from many learning experience except for those occurring in the most private of circumstances.

Different Logic

From a practical point of view, “to err is wrong” makes sense. Our survival in the everyday world requires us to perform thousand of small tasks without failure. Think about it: you wouldn’t last very long if you were to step out in front of traffic or stick your hand a pot of boiling water. In addition, engineers whose bridges collapse, stock brokers who lose money for their clients, and copywriters whose ad campaigns decrease sales won’t keep their jobs very long.

Nevertheless, too great an adherence to the belief “to err is wrong” can greatly undermine your attempts to generate new ideas. If you are more concerned with producing right answers than generating original ideas, you’ll probably make uncritical use of the rules, formulae, and procedures used to obtain these right answers. By doing this, you’ll by-pass the germinal phase of the creative process, and thus spend litter time testing assumptions, challenging the rules, asking what-if questions, or just playing around with the problem. All of these techniques will produce some incorrect answers, but in the germinal phase errors are viewed as a necessary by-product of creative thinking. As Yaz would put it, “if you want the hits, be prepared for the misses.” That’s the way the game of life goes.

Errors as Stepping Stones

Whenever an error pops up, the usual response is “Jeez, another screw up, what went wrong this time?” the creative thinker, on the other hand, will realize the potential value of errors, and perhaps say something like, “Would you look at that! Where can it lead our thinking?” and then he or she will go on to use the error as a stepping stone to a new idea. As a matter of fact, the whole history of discovery is filed with people who used erroneous assumptions and failed ideas as stepping-stones to new ideas. Columbus thought he was finding a shorter route to India. Johannes Kepler stumbled on to the idea of interplanetary gravity because of assumptions that were right for the wrong reasons. And, Thomas Edison knew 1800 ways not to build a light bulb.

The following story about the automotive genius Charles Kettering exemplifies the spirit of working through erroneous assumptions to good ideas. In 1912, when the automobile industry was just beginning to grow, Kettering was interested in improving gasoline engine efficiency. The problem he faced was“knockthe phenomenon in which gasoline takes too long to burn in the cylinder-thereby reducing efficiency.

Kettering began searching for ways to eliminate the “knock.” He thought to him, “How can I get the gasoline to combust in the cylinder at an earlier time?” the key concept here is “early”. Searching for analogous situations, he looked around for models of “things that happen early.” He thought of historical models, physical models, and biological models. Finally, he remembered a particular plant, the trailing arbutus, which “happens early,” i.e., it blooms in the snow (“earlier” than other plants). One of this plant’s chief characteristics is its’ red leaves, which help the plant retain light at certain wavelengths. Kettering figured that it must be the red color, which made the trailing arbutus bloom earlier.

Now came the critical step in Kettering’s chain of thought. He asked himself, “How can I make the gasoline red?” perhaps I’ll put red dye in the gasoline—maybe that’ll make it combust earlier.” He looked around his workshop, and found that he didn’t have any red dye. But he did happen to have some iodine—perhaps that would do. He added the iodine to the gasoline and, lo and behold, the engine didn’t “knock”.

[英语作文写作的需要背诵的部分

滥用虚词，会造成句子重复罗嗦，同样会造成句子语意不明，甚至造成逻辑上的错误。小编收集了虚词的使用应注意“四要”，欢迎阅读。

一、要弄清虚词的意义和用法。特别是表达功能相近的虚词的意义和用法。

如93年上海第6题：“参加研讨会的全体学者对汉语或英语都很精通。”句中的虚词“或”用错了，“或”是表选择关系的连词，而且“或”与“都”不能搭配，它应改为“和”。

二、要弄清虚词的正确搭配。

汉语中的虚词大多数是单独使用的，也有成对配合使用的。搭配有一定规矩，有的已形成固定格式，不能随意更改。否则就违背了语言习惯，影响语意表达。如96年第3题：依次填入下列横线的关联词语恰当的一组是：

①上千吨的轮船碰上这样大的风浪也得上下颠簸，这么一条小船。

②挖这样的井，占地多，不合算，井的四周都是沙土，很容易塌陷。

③改革后，产品质量提高了，款式新颖了，包装也精美了，因而更加受到群众欢迎。

A况且何况而且B况且而且况且

C何况而且何况D何况况且而且

“何况、而且、况且”三个都是表示递进关系的连词，但与他们搭配的虚词各不相同。“何况”有前后对比意，有反问语气，常与“尚且”“都”搭配：“而且”常与“不但”“不仅”搭配。再看③“产品质量提高了，款式新颖了，包装也精美了”，前两句是并列关系，与后一句构成递进关系，即“不但质量……款式……而且包装也精美了”。由此可排除B、C，再看A、D两项，“况且”有进一步说明理由的作用，故正确答案应选D.

三、要弄清虚词的正确位置。

使用虚词，要注意它们在句中的位置，如果位置恰当，句意就准确鲜明，否则，不仅会使句意不明。甚至会改变句子原意。这类考查点，常常出现在病句辨识或修改有语病的语段中，如99年第5题D句：“3月17日，6名委员因受贿丑闻被逐出国际奥委会。第二天，世界各大报纸关于这起震惊国际体坛的事件都作了详细报道”。这句就犯了虚词“关于”位置不当的毛病。“关于……事件”这个介宾短语不能放在主语后面，如要保留这一短语，就应将它放在主语“世界各大报纸”前，或者将“关于”改成“对于”。再有，在复句中，如果前后两个分句的主语相同，关联词语可放在主语后边，如果不同，就应放在主语之前。

四、不要滥用虚词。

滥用虚词，会造成句子重复罗嗦，同样会造成句子语意不明，甚至造成逻辑上的错误。如97年第7题D：“问题的严重性还在于对种种不爱惜人民币的错误作法，以及随意将人民币放大后销售的违法行为，尚未引起社会的广泛关注。”，这句是单句，但结构较复杂。通过语法分析可知，此句的主语是“严重性”，谓语是“在于”，“在于的后边都是宾语。再分析宾语，它的主语，是”对……行为这个介宾短语，但介宾短语是不能作主语的，“对”的参入淹没了宾语的主语，造成了句子结构上是混乱，去掉“对”句意反而明确。由此可知，这句中的虚词“对”是滥用了。

导语：英语作文在英语试卷中还是相当重要的一部分，你知道写作有哪些技巧吗?下面是yjbys作文网小编为您收集整理的资料，希望对您有所帮助。

初中英语作文分为四等。一等文：13-15分;二等文：9-12分;三等文：5-8分;四等文：0-4分。教给大家十个字，搞定初中英语写作，帮你拿到一等文。

要点+结构+逻辑+语法+亮点

要点：

实际上中考英语写作就等于两个字，翻译!因为中考英语写作一般会给出几个要点，要求必须在文章中有所体现。文章写的再好，只要缺少要点就会扣分。所以要点，也就是文章的第二段内容，要做到全，围绕中心。

结构：

中考最流行的结构就是三段式，深受各地区中考英语写作阅卷老师的喜爱。为什么尼?因为这种结构十分清晰。“观点——要点——总结”让人一目了然。三段式的第一段：简单明了，开门见山，不超过2句话，如，我们想表达小强很强壮，第一段直接说XQis extremely strong。观点明确，这一句足矣。2014年中考英语写作技巧

第二段：分2-3点说为什么他强壮。1. 每天吃10顿饭，He has ten mealseveryday!详举吃的是什么。2. 每天运动2小时，He does exercise 2 hours a day!详举做了什么运动。

第三段：经过第二段的论证，可以得出结论。但请注意，不能完全照抄第一段，要有升华。也可以提出希望和建议等。如，Howstrong and robust XQ is!I hope to be him one day!

逻辑：

这里的逻辑实际指的就是逻辑词。最常用的就是表示递进的，转折的，总结的逻辑词等。递进：除了first，second，third，finally等还可以使用高级点的，如first of all(首先)，in addition，whatsmore，moreover(都是另外的意思)，in a word，all inall(表示总结的)。转折：but，yet，however等。真正有经验的阅卷老师会很注意这些逻辑连接词，因为这些词体现了这个文章的思路。

语法：

其他几点都不是硬性的要求，不那样做不能说是错，只能说是不好，但是语法却是硬性的。如，单词的使用，时态等。

亮点：

当我们将前八个字都做得很完美的时候也只能得到一个二等文的上。要想得到一等文，最后两个字，亮点至关重要。大家设想如果我们是阅卷老师。有两篇写人美丽的作文摆在我们面前，都是结构清晰的三段式，要点都很全，都用了一些逻辑词，都没有语法错误，但是A篇只用了beautiful，good-looking，B篇却用到了attractive，charming，catching等，我坚信正常人都会给B篇高分的。这些高级一点的词汇，词组，句型便是我们得到一等文的最有力的绝招。所以，以后写英语作文要养成一般词汇限量用的好习惯。

英语作文依靠的是同学们的语感和平时的积累，但是在面临中考的紧要关头，要想在短时间内提高英语写作水平不是一件容易的事情，这就需要同学们掌握中考英语作文写作技巧。

看图作文是以图画或图表来提供目的、对象、时间、地点、内容等情景，要求作者借助图画，通过联想将一组画面的直观内容转换成传神达意的文字形式，用于反映图中所表现的思想内容。

从写作体裁上看，可说明介绍，可叙事记人、可写景状物，也可以发表议论。

1.仔细审题、弄清题目要求

看图作文主要考查考生的观察能力、分析能力、想象能力、创造能力和语言表达能力。

想写好看图作文，必须遵循以下步骤：

首先，必须通读试题中的每一个字，认真观察所给的每一幅图画，正确理解提示所提出的各种要求，从而明确作文的中心思想，判断文章的类型、特点，了解文章的重点内容，力求切中题意。

2.审好图，确定要素

认真观察图中的故事发生于何时?何地?图中的人物为何人?他们做了什么事情?结果如何?

3.考虑用恰当的词语、句型和时态

弄懂了图上的大意后，在内心构思一个基本的框架，考虑用什么样的句型、词语、时态来充分表达文章的内容，尽可能用你熟悉的词语或句型，力求语言准确、意思明了。

4.列出要点，组织语言

在认真审题、弄清题意的基础上，我们应逐个完整无误地把内容要点列出来，我们可以在每幅图画的旁边用简单的词语标出其所表达的要点，这样，既可以提醒自己不要漏写了要点，又能防止过分发挥。接着就可以将内容要点译成英文词语或句子，以便下一步组织语言，形成短文。要注意使用适当的连接词或过渡性语句，以使上下文更为连贯，过渡自然。

5.详细得当

对一些细节方面的内容，如果是文章必不可少的细节，在写作时不可将这些细节忽略;如果是可有可无的细节，则可视具体情况进行增删。因此，我们在审图时，一定要注意各图中的一些细节内容，看其是否影响文章的内容。

6.仔细检查、修改

文章写完后，应进行必要的检查、修改，力求全文内容表达准确、完整，并最大限度减少错误。

具体从如下做起：

(1)核对图中要点是否有遗漏;

(2)时态、语态是否正确;

(3)文章句、段、篇是否连贯;

(4)用词是否得当、词数是否符合要求;

(5)单词大小写、拼写、标点是否准确无误。

最后提醒大家：一篇好的作文不但要内容写得好，字迹也要美观、工整、漂亮。

高考语文作文名师点津系列――记叙文运思

从小学二、三年级开始学写作文就写记叙文，写到高中了，还是解决不了记叙文的"疑难杂症"：

1.行文拖沓，故事感不强；

2."流水帐"结构，缺乏思想性；

3.平淡无味，缺乏鲜明、生动的意象。

【实用兵法】

写"标准的记叙文"，把握三个词：故事、思想、描写

1."故事"就是"出事了"。

◇"出事了"，出什么事了？谁家出事了？在哪儿出事了？因为什么出事了？什么时候出事了？……记叙要素全了。

◇"出事了"，是因为有矛盾冲突，利益的、情感的、性格的……越错综复杂越有看头。

◇"出事了"，就得解决，解决就有个过程--精彩的情节渲染点儿，扣人心弦的"疙瘩"吊着胃口慢慢解。

经过几年的写作磨砺后，我算是总结出了一些考场实用技巧。小编收集了2017年小升初作文指导：考场作文小技巧，欢迎阅读。

①多写，可以是随性创作，可以是简短的几百字甚至几十字的心情感悟。如果有时间可以考虑两天写一篇，然后每周利用一点时间反复修改写的作文，力求做到曹雪芹对待《红楼梦》那样，增删五次，批阅十载。

②多看，看看一些名家的作品，在此我特别推荐两本书，《汪国真诗集》《李清照诗集》首先这两本书是金典名作，可以带给我们心灵的启迪，前进的方向，不放弃的坚守的勇气，其次这两本里的创作感情与考场作文的出题思路有异曲同工之妙，多看能保证你在写作时永不停下来过度思考。

③多抄多背，多摘抄一些自己觉得好的，有文采的句子，然后闲适时多拿出来读一读，遇到金典的势必要背下来，因为日后定有用处。(PS：本人小背万字摘抄，写作文直接下笔，遇到容易走题的时候巧妙套用句子，不仅不失分，反而显得有些文采，二十分钟一篇作文，分数绝对不低)

④多感悟，作文考察的就是我们对于生活的感悟，常怀一颗感恩之心细细咀嚼生活中发生的一些简单却又深味的事情。

⑤学会有自己的观点，力求的是避免千篇一律的写一样的文章，尽量选择标新立异走自己的道路，发表自己的观点，不要怕失败，因为怕失败你就永远写不好作文

⑥要有自信，自信是成功的前提，曾经我也对于作文没有自信，但是不断的写不断的反思还是让我近乎“走向成功”，你要清楚，现在的失败并没有多少人会耻笑你，如果有也不用害怕，走自己的路努力奋斗日后一定“回报”他们

⑦写作文前可以有两个选择。一：列不超过十分钟的提纲，因为如果列提纲时间超过十分钟不仅浪费时间，而且会使我们变得焦躁，紧迫，那么结果可想而知。二：直接如题，边写边构思，不要怕走题因为走不到哪里去。

⑧遇到半命题作文，首先不要忙着填题目，直接写作文，等到写好作文后阅读几遍再明确主题最后完善题目。(PS：好处：可以避免走题，可以更好的发挥水平，因为没有局限)

⑨应有良好的心态，如果写作文写到一半突然思绪全无，千万不要焦躁，停下几分钟反复阅读已经写下来的部分，你一定会找到继续写下去的感觉。

⑩应学会在开头，结尾做文章。因为开头结尾照应，且有文章就能轻松取得几分，学会在中间内容处巧设悬念，给阅卷老师保留一份神秘感，最少也能给你个内容充实的分数

最后：不要给自己留太多写作文的时间，但也不能太少。控制在20-50分钟，因为人只有在紧迫的时候才能充分发掘出自己的潜能。

：

导语：话题作文是今年来的中考作文的热点，下面小编带来话题作文的写作技巧，一起来看看吧!

话题作文要求宽松，没有审题障碍，看起来比较好写，但恰恰是因为这一点，往往易让学生走进误区。因此，以下几点尤其应该引起注意

1、不要把话题当文章。

话题作文的导语提供的是写作范围，并非作文题目。人家的话题是什么，你就以什么为题，否则就有可能出现不应有的失误，出力不讨好。

2、不要以为“文体不限”就是“不要文体”。

如果不管文体，信马由缰，文章就会不伦不类。所以一定要选定一种文体，然后按这一文体的有关要求写作。

3、不要摘录导语。

不少考生误将导语作为材料作文的“材料”，一开篇就“引”入文中，然后才开始或编述故事，或展开议论，这样的开篇自然也就成为文章的一大败笔。

4、不要泛泛而谈。

有些学生“拿”起话题就写，根本没考虑“大题小做”，浮光掠影，泛泛而谈，致使作文中充满了大话、假话、空话、套话，全文找不出明晰的中心。

5、不要游离“话题”。

少数同学对“话题”不假思索，写出来的文章根本没有触及话题，甚至与“话题有关的词眼也找不到，完全成了自由作文。因此，写作前一定要读懂“话题”，写作中一定要扣住话题。其实，有的文章只要在恰当的地方点示一下话题，文章就不担心离题了。

在写事作文中，我们的第一个要求就是要写的清楚，下面是小编整理的小升初作文指导：写事，欢迎阅读。

写事要求清楚、具体。一件事情的发生，总离不开时间、地点、人物和事情的起因、经过、结果。这就是人们常说的“记叙文六要素”。把这六个方面写清楚了，才能让读者明白究竟是一件什么事。同时，还要寓理于事，即通过一件事或几件事来说明一个道理。在六要素当中，起因、经过、结果是事情的主要环节。其中，“经过”部分又是事情的核心，是全文成败的关键所在。在小学生的作文里，“经过”部分写得不具体是带有普遍性的问题。小学生的继续文不感人，平淡乏味，这是其中一个重要原因。记事的记叙文可分两种：写事和写活动。

(一)怎样写事

一是把“经过”部分分成几个阶段，然后按照先后顺序一层一层地写得清楚。写的时候多文几个“后来怎样”，文章就具体了。

二是注意材料的详略，有所侧重。对一些重要的过程、场面要细致描绘，使读者有如身临其境。

三是对事件中的人物，特别是主要人物，当时是“怎么说的”、“怎么做的”，又是“怎么想的”，一定要写具体。

(二)怎样写活动活动都是有目的、有形式、有过程的。搞什么活动?为什么搞活动?则眼搞活动?活动的结果怎样?都要写清楚。写活动也要求写清楚“六要素”，要把活动的时间、地点、人物和活动开始、经过、结果写出来。在整个活动当中，不是写一个人，二是写一群人;不是用一两件事来写人物，而是通过写一个活动场面，来表现人物的精神面貌。写活动的记叙文，最大的特点就是必须有活动的基本内容、主要过程和重要场面。把印象最深刻的内容作为重点，把自己看到的、听到的、亲身经历的主要部分记叙下来，采用点面结合的方法，既要写好群体活动，又要把个体代表写进去;既要写整个场面，又要突出典型人物。

写活动的文章一般包括两大部分：一是活动的经过，二是自己的感受。如果写“参观”活动，就要用“观一处，感一处”的方法。写整个活动的过程，要用顺叙法，即按活动的先后顺序，把活动时间、地点、人物及活动的经过和结果依次写出来。

1、游记：是描写游览中的所见所闻，表达自己思想感情的记叙文。

2、游记的题材非常广泛，凡是游览中见到社会生活、风土人情、山川景物、名胜古迹以及听到的神话传说等，都可以作为游记的材料。

3、游记分为很多种：以记录行程为主的是记叙型游记；以抒发感情为主的是抒情型游记；以描绘景物、景观为主的是写景型游记；通过记游来说明一个道理的，是说理型游记。

4、何才能把游记写好呢？

一、中心明确、重点突出。首先，在写游记的过程中一定要把主体交待清楚，如，游的人或者集体、要写的景物等，要交代具体。其次，要注意在描写中一定要有一个明确的中心。另外，要努力观察，把所要描写的景物有重点、有层次地写具体，写形象。

二、线索清楚。写游记一定要有一条合理的线索贯穿其中。可以按游览路线写，可以按空间顺序写。

三、抒发自己的真情实感，看了那些风景名胜，你一定会有自己的想法、态度，那么我们就要把它写到作文中去，抒发自己的感情。